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Director's Memo 2020-05-18

Monday, May 18, 2020

Congratulations to the ACTE Region IV winners

Four Oklahomans won ACTE Region IV awards: Teresa Pinkston, Tulsa Technology Center, Administrator of the Year; Cecil Wainscott, ODCTE, Postsecondary Teacher of the Year; Amanda Eastridge-English, Metro Technology Centers, Teacher of the Year; and Kristal McCathern, Southern Technology Center, Carl Perkins Community Service.

Pinkston is the assistant director of Tulsa Tech’s Riverside Campus. Wainscott is a licensed trades instructor at Lexington Skills Center. Eastridge-English is a law enforcement services instructor at Metro Tech. McCathern is a cosmetology instructor at Southern Tech.

A new CareerTech Horizon podcast episode is coming soon

In the age of social distancing and safer-at-home orders, many people have had to brush up on their homemaking skills. These skills, often taken as electives in high school curriculum, have now become what many consider essential.

CareerTech Horizon will sit down with a longtime family and consumer sciences educator and reflect on these skills returning to prominence.

You can subscribe to CareerTech Horizon on your favorite podcast app or platform and follow the podcast on Facebook and Twitter. Or you can ask your smart speaker to “Play CareerTech Horizon.”

CareerTech Champion: Hunter Poston -- Meridian Technology Center and Central Technology Center

EMS Hunter Poston stands in the doorway of a LifeNet ambulance.THEN: A Perkins Tryon High School student whose CareerTech experiences began in high school and continued after college.

Hunter Poston started down his health care career path by enrolling in Meridian Technology Center’s pre-nursing program. He loved it enough to enroll in Northern Oklahoma College’s health services technology program after high school. Poston left NOC with an Associate of Applied Science degree and a passion for emergency medicine.

Hunter Poston started down his health care career path by enrolling in Meridian Technology Center’s pre-nursing program. He loved it enough to enroll in Northern Oklahoma College’s health services technology program after high school. Poston left NOC with an Associate of Applied Science degree and a passion for emergency medicine.

He returned to Meridian Tech to get his EMT certification, then continued his CareerTech education at Central Technology Center’s paramedic program. At Central Tech, Poston was active in HOSA, the CareerTech student organization affiliated with health careers education. His public health team took first place at HOSA’s international competition in 2019.

He said CareerTech taught him how to

  • Be a more confident public speaker.
  • Remain calm in chaotic situations.
  • Think critically.

“Speaking in front of a small audience is required of me on almost every emergency call I run,” he said. “I may have to speak with family and friends of my patient or give instruction to other health care providers.”

NOW: Poston is a paramedic at LifeNet EMS. He has earned numerous professional certifications, including Emergency Medical Technician and National Registry Paramedic.

CareerTech Champion: Dean Baker -- Francis Tuttle Technology Center

Francis Tuttle Tech manufacturing-machining technology instructor Dean BakerDean Baker didn’t want to teach the way he’d been taught. The manufacturing-machining technology instructor at Francis Tuttle Technology Center said his instructor gave his students a blueprint and said, “Please write.” The students wrote code, and the instructor made corrections where they were needed.

That was 40 years ago, and today the self-proclaimed G-code guy is teaching his students to write similar G-codes that manipulate machines to perform tasks. But today’s students are working with a high-tech machine powered by the Siemens SINUMERIK 828D control, which is giving his students game-changing skills that employers seek.

The 828D has a conversational feature that teaches students what is happening behind the machines when they push a button. Conversational computer numerical control machines have come about as a result of a shortage of workers qualified to write code.

Baker serves on the SkillsUSA board of directors, and the forward-thinking instructor was recently highlighted in Technical Education Post, a journal for technical, technology and STEM education.

At Francis Tuttle, Dean stresses three things with his students:

  • Safety – the most important lesson he teaches.
  • Being mindful of others and their surroundings.
  • Problem-solving.

Dean said he borrowed his philosophy of teaching from Albert Einstein, who said, “Education is not the learning of facts. It’s rather the training of the mind to think.”

Useful links

Follow us on Twitter at @okcareertech and find us on Facebook at OKCareerTech and on Instagram at oklahomacareertech and read our blog, Oklahoma CareerTech Delivers.

For news about Oklahoma’s CareerTech System, subscribe to CareerTech communications.

Nothing is too small to know, and nothing is too big to attempt. -- William Van Horne
Last Modified on May 15, 2023
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